Thanks for all of the support and suggestions!
I have decided to removing the quilting and and very special quilting board memeber has so kindly and generously offered to quilt it for me. I am going to open a thread about her generosity next! I am overwhelmed by it.
And to clear up a few details, it was not a LQS who recommended her, but a fabric store, a large well known fabric store with a huge presence in this area, one I thought I could trust for a recommendation. It has been around for ages, long before I was even born.
My second mistake was not following my gut feeling. When I left the quilt, even though the lady was very friendly and seemed knowledgeable about quilts and quilting, I had a bad feeling. I have good instincts and should have followed them.
My third mistake was paying her, rather than confronting her. Once I saw my quilt when I picked it up I did not really notice how horrible it was at first glance. I saw a couple of things, but thought maybe I was being too critical. And I was somewhat shocked and embarrassed for her, if you know what I mean. It was not until I got it home, unfolded it and saw the horrendous quilting.
I have learned many lessons here, some costly lessons, and I will need to be more careful about being so trusting of everyone. I should have checked her out more thourghly, but relied on what I thought was a good recommendation.
I am going to contact the store today and tell them what happened, but as far a contacting the quilter, not sure I can do that. She was so proud and really thought she did a good job. She had me wait while she took photos of the quilt. I am wondering if her eye sight is failing or to her this is good enough. She definitely needs more practice if she is going to quilt for others. I know many of you will not agree with not contacting her, but it is not my personality to do this. I wish sometimes I could be more aggressive this way, but I just can't. I will have to live with the finanical loss, cost of a hard lesson learned.
Best of all, thankfully I do believe my quilt will be saved! I have a lot of stitching to remove, but I am excited that it can hopefully be fixed, and this will not keep me from pusuing my new found love of quilting!
Thanks again for your suport - this board ahs some of the best members ever!